THE CHICKENS HAVE COME HOME TO ROOST: The President’s Cancer Panel, established in 1971, is sounding the alarm bell about chemicals in our daily lives, including those coming from conventional agriculture. The panel is at the top of the “medical mainstream” and not part of the Organic or Sustainable Ag movement. The three person panel has one vacancy at this time and the other two professionals were appointed by President George W. Bush. They want to let people know they are concerned about chemicals from all sources and they are stating that we should be concerned. They are concerned about the increasing rates of cancer, obesity, diabetes and autism in children and adults. Research shows our children are born pre-polluted and then mother’s milk usually provides a further dose of up to 200 or more manmade chemicals. However, mother’s milk is still preferred over a synthetic formula. The final statement in the panel’s letter to the President is as follows: “The Panel urges you most strongly to use the power of your office to remove the carcinogens and other toxins from our food, water and air that needlessly increase health care costs, cripple our Nation’s productivity, and devastate American lives.”

As you must realize, this is quite a breakthrough in our fight for clean air, food and water. The report blames weak laws, lax enforcement and fragmented authority. Sound familiar? Since WW II there has been an attitude that since these new chemical molecules are used in industry, agriculture and consumer goods, they must be safe unless proven otherwise. Deliberately moving farmers off the farm and into the cities/factories and growing the country’s economy was the main emphasis. Anyone who questioned any sort of “progress” that involved making money was considered “anti-American”. There were scientists that warned about the chemicals, but little heed was paid until enough wildlife damage was done to prompt the research and publication of Rachael Carson’s Silent Spring in 1962.

A great deal of good bio-physics research was done in the 70’s which began to discover the true “nature of nature” or how all living things function. A single living cell is complicated enough to be compared to a factory making autos. As many electro-chemical transactions take place in each cell as in the auto factory. When you walk into a factory, you experience noise, smells, sparks, heat, etc. These are all indications of inefficiency. If you could walk into a cell, all you would experience would be silence, as the thousands of transactions per second are 100% efficient.

When you combine cells to make organisms such as plants, animals and us humans, 100% efficiency is maintained with total electromagnetic integration of the cells complete with instant communication to all other cells in the organism. Each cell uses water molecules as wave guides for internal transmission as well as electron clouds for the instant whole body interaction/communication. Moving ionized calcium and other minerals either way across a cell membrane is the major way of passing “information”. Biophysicists have documented that all living things are very sensitive to electronic, radioactive and chemical contaminants because of the way they are organized and function. The contaminants destroy the efficiency, opening the organism to diseases. Human systems affected include the endocrine (hormones), neurological and immune. No wonder we are sick!

This government report is nothing less than a “Call to Arms”! We must stop the increasing number and amounts of manmade chemicals and radiation sources introduced to our daily lives by air, water, electronics, medical procedures & devices, packaging and food so that our national health doesn’t continue to decline and our sickness costs continue to rise. We already know that the major cause of personal bankruptcy is medical costs. The country could be bankrupt by the process. This is not a statement against universal health care.  It is a statement that we need to have the political and personal will to change several paradigms to stop the declining health and increasing cost of sickness. Since this is an agricultural newsletter, we will concentrate on that topic. However, if I was “King for a Day”, I would ban all lawn and garden chemicals immediately and take several other actions that would probably get me hung.

We can no longer afford to use the old excuse that you can’t stop making or selling a product or process because, “jobs will be lost” or “a stock price will go down”. When you calculate the actual cost of contamination, lack of nutrition, sickness and sickness care and special education services, the drain on the economy is far greater than a loss of a specific product or industry. The country didn’t go broke when cars and trucks replaced horses and it won’t go broke when solar panels and wind turbines replace some coal fired plants. The economy will actually improve as we move toward sustainability and reduction of toxicity in the environment.

The world has the technology and inputs (both naturally occurring and processed) to do away with the need for almost all pesticides, herbicides and fungicides and still grow an equal or greater amount of food with more life-giving nutrition.  If a rescue product is needed, there are organic versions available.

The problem is that the majority of growers have never heard this and probably wouldn’t believe it if they did. That puts a great deal of responsibility on you, my readers. If you walk the walk, you also need to talk the talk. You are far more influential with your neighbors (farmers & consumers) than most other sources of information. However, there are powerful sources working against all our attempts to change the paradigm. The most powerful ones are just human nature, peer pressure and fear of change or the unknown. The other powerful forces are commercial and institutional. The pesticide industry is huge. It will take years, if ever, to shut it down. Many universities still have vested interest in researching pesticides, but happily, they now also have researchers working on non-toxic strategies to deal with weeds, disease and insects.

There is a growing public movement that wants healthy food grown in a healthy way. They may not understand all the intricacies of organic, sustainable, natural, free range, grass fed, etc. but they do like the idea of “locally grown” and “chemical free” which most interpret to be “organic”. They don’t want chemicals in their food supply and they don’t want the produce shipped across the US or brought in from a foreign country. The “Slow Food” and “Eat Local” movements are impacting many consumers, suppliers, grocery stores and restaurants. The “Grassfed” movement is progressing well, even though it has strong opposition from the commodity beef/feed lot industry.

We all have a moral imperative to change the paradigm in any way we can. Operating an agricultural paradigm based on largely false premises that require rescue chemistry automatically gives you a contaminated food, water and air system – all rainfall contains pesticides. Operating a health system without correcting the nutritional and contamination problems simply doesn’t work. This leaves a “sickness” system that also tends to ignore and be unaware of the nature of nature (especially in the “war on cancer”). The sickness system keeps trying to use more expensive electronic equipment or find a new drug as a magic bullet. Neither the agricultural system nor the sickness system is sustainable. I fear for my grandchildren. Do an “old man” a favor! HELP CHANGE THE PARADIGMS!

Now that I have made the bold statement above about the technology and products being available for a sustainable agriculture, what are they? The following are attempts at answers to those who say it can’t be done.

MINERALS ARE THE BASIS OF LIFE: As such they are the key to a crops’ nutritional content. Most countries have mineral rich, rock deposits that can be used to replenish broad spectrum minerals. Even those deposits with only 3-7% K such as the oldHybrotite [granite dust] product mined in Georgia are sufficient to provide for normal crop production. Low phosphorous apatite rocks can do the same thing when microbes are involved. These mineral deposits often contain 50 or more trace and rare earth minerals so necessary to re-vitalize soils. Those countries lacking their own mineral deposits can import them from neighboring countries. It would be money better spent than importing simplistic N-P-K fertilizer and the chemicals necessary to rescue the crops grown.

When I did volunteer agricultural consulting work in northern Brazil near Rio Blanco, my conclusion was that the areas’ major limiting factor to producing good quality produce was the lack of lime. Lime could easily have been brought in from other states. I also recommended composting, using the diversity of the jungle fauna to supply a variety of trace minerals. I suggested that the local government lab start analyzing the various plant species to determine their mineral spectrum.

If all else fails, using fish, seaweed, seawater, compost/manure, intensive grazing, multi species grazing, cover crops, food processing residues and composted plant material over a longer period of time will gradually rebuild the soils from a mineral standpoint. Remember, each plant, weed or otherwise, is an antenna picking up minerals from the air and putting them back in the soil, even if harvested and fed to livestock, it comes back in the manure.

SOIL MICROORGANISMS MAKE THE WHOLE SYSTEM SUSTAINABLE: Microbes make the minerals available to the growing crop. Just stopping the use of rescue chemicals can start the process of biological recovery. To speed up the process, there are literally hundreds of biological products and stimulants available in the market place. Those who can’t afford to purchase packaged microbes can be taught to brew microbes in buckets using darker, fungi laden soils located under leaf mulches while adding compost, manures, fish, seaweed and carbohydrates/sugars. For more sophisticated methods, see the article Inputs & Uses by Jackie Prell in July 2010 AcresUSA. If philanthropy can provide and teach subsistence level societies how to use solar mud ovens, mosquito netting, pedal driven water pumps, outhouses, etc., then it would be just as easy to dispense packets that can be put into a compost pile or bucket! Recipients can be taught to save a small amount of “mother” to start the next batch of compost with.

ALL PLANTS NEED NITROGEN: You can produce all the nitrogen you need from the air using the microbes that already exist in nature. Over thirty years of research in Indiahas resulted in isolating naturally occurring organisms [Azotobacter] that fix N from the air in the soil and on the leaf. The organisms are in cyst form that gives them a long shelf life and ability to survive over a wide range of pH’s and temperatures as well as on leaf surfaces.  The Azotobacter also continues to function during heavy rain conditions (see TESTIMONIALS below). When combined with liquid fish or compost, which greatly enhances the performance of both, I can’t imagine the hungriest hybrid corn in the world running short of N before maturity. CSI offers these microbes in our Blooming Blossom line. There are also the old standard sources of N such as legumes, manure, extracted protein, etc.

One of the interesting observations about naturally “fixed” N from the air is the difference in plant reaction. Growers report a different “greening up” than observed when applying chemical N which produces the dark green of conventional Ag (see TESTIMONIALS below). There are several possibilities for these observations. One would be because of the fact that the nitrogen fixing organisms in our Bioplin and NutriFoliar products from Blooming Blossom also produce B and E vitamins and other growth stimulants on the leaf surface. Another explanation would be that the N molecules fixed by the organism have a different structure/frequency than a manufactured molecule of N. Plants recognizes sources of N that will resonate with their basic frequency and also ones that will require the use of the least amount of plant energy. Plants will pass up chemically produced nitrate and ammonium in favor of amino acid or protein based N any time it is available.

PHOSPHOROUS IS A PROBLEM: As we know, P is critical to building sugars/brix but the world’s supply of P has peaked. Mycorrhizea fungi do better with moderate amounts of P. Phosphorous solublizing microbes combined with mycorrhizea usually does away with the need for manufactured starters containing soluble/available P. Indian research has already proven this using phosphorous releasing bacteria as a replacement for starter fertilizer on fruits, flowers and vegetables which are high users of P as well as on field crops. Natural sources of P for mineralization include several types of phosphate rock [colloidal, hard rock and reactive rock], fish, manure and bone meal.

The use of herbicides/fungicides, excessive soluble P fertilizers and excessive tillage kills off the mycorrhizal activity in a soil. Correcting those factors can solve the P problems in all but the weakest, lowest P content soils. If you have low phosphate soils, now is the time to add a natural phosphate and stop depending on soluble phosphates, which are expected to rise dramatically in price in the next few years (see OTHER NEWS below).

WHAT ABOUT WEEDS? Since we now have about every crop known to man grown “certified organically”, it is obvious that cultural practices have been developed to handle weed problems. We have tillage, rotations, cover crops, fallow, replaceable or degradable coverings, sheep, ducks & geese, hand labor, cross-drilling of grains and cultivation. Please refer to the July 2010 AcresUSA article, Non-Chemical Weed Control for Commercial-Scale Crops by Kathy Birt for further refinements.

The method that offers the most long term solution to weed control seems to get lost in the shuffle – Mineral Balancing. Ream’s methods, taught in the 70’s, are still valid today. Balance and activate the soil such that the available P on a LaMotte Soil Test is about double the K availability.  Also manage the Calcium:Magnesium Ratio as close to 7:1 as possible. This method worked in the 70’s and it is still working today. You can also use the old weed suppression trick of 2 gallons each liquid calcium and molasses in 20 gallons of water applied after the last disturbance of the soil (including the planter itself) to temporarily change the P:K ratios and stop the grass and broadleaf germination. The calcium suppresses the grasses and the molasses stimulates the phosphorous releasing bacteria. Or, you can use our new liquid suspension minerals containing Ca & P to do the same thing.

Remember, weeds only germinate, grow and flourish according to the current soil conditions. If you don’t like the current weed situation, change the conditions. Using aherbicide just prolongs the pressure of that species as it does nothing to modify mineralization, bio-activity or soil structure. It not only doesn’t help, the negative affects of Glyphosate, the killing ingredient in Roundup type herbicides, are so pervasive and disruptive, that a “sane” system of regulation would have banned them long ago (see OTHER NEWS below). Uncontrollable weeds are a not so gentle reminder that “YOU HAVEN’T GOT IT RIGHT YET!

WHAT ABOUT DISEASES? The normal state of all living systems is homeostasis or complete balance in every sense. Diseases can only occur when there is an imbalance. The imbalance starts with a disruption in the internal communication system of individual cells. The disruption can be caused by nutritional, electromagnetic or toxicity factors. A disease life form can then establish itself and inject further toxins into a plant. The late Bruce Tainio proved that the balanced/homeostasis state is reflected by the pH of the plant juices. The further the plant sap moves below 6.4, the greater the loss of homeostasis and the greater the attractiveness the plant presents to the disease organism. Most plant diseases are fungal in nature, with some obvious bacterial and viral examples.

Greg Willis states that fungal diseases are only attracted to already dying tissue (see OTHER NEWS below). In other words, loss of homeostasis has already occurred, dead cells/tissue are already present. Greg has created an antifungal field spray (energy patterns imprinted into water) using Steiner concepts that effectively stops fungus in its tracks. Also, Cornell research shows that fungal diseases cannot produce a hyphae or foot to penetrate a plant if the surface pH is 8.4 or above. Baking soda and powdered milk are effective in raising the surface pH when you first see any indication of a fungus in your area or on your plants. The long term solution is adequate positive ions like calcium, magnesium, potassium and sodium in the plant to provide the natural alkalinity and adequate copper necessary for fungal resistance.

WHAT ABOUT INSECTS: The exact same concepts concerning diseases apply to insects except for the pH factor. A plant with sap above 6.4 increases its attractiveness to insects as it rises (Tainio). The other major factor is the local environment. As soon as you stop spraying poisons and leave nearby wild plants, nature creates a natural system of checks and balances involving predators and parasites to control the insect affecting your crop (see OTHER NEWS below). Growers can also use pheromone disruption (IPM) where nutritional balance is difficult to achieve, such as in trying to convert conventionally farmed mature trees to organic. It may take 2-4 years to rebuild homeostasis.

Nutrition is still the answer to resistance to all diseases and insect problems. And nutrition requires mineral and carbon rich, bio-active soils. Diseases and Insects are the symptom of a failing crop, not the cause of it!

GOOD HUMUS LEVELS ARE A MUST: Active carbon (a component of humus) holds four times its weight in water. It is the primary food source for microbes and it is one of the major casualties of conventional salt & rescue chemical agriculture. Carbon helps create soil structure/tilth (see Dr. Jones OTHER NEWS quotes below). Since the only way conventional ag has raised soil carbon levels is through no-till approaches including toxic rescue chemistry, it’s time for serious changes. The good news is that Sustainable Ag sequesters Carbon!

ENERGY IS THE FINAL ANSWER: It has been an uphill battle getting growers around the world to recognize the value of the Albrecht method of soil balancing (CEC tests). Even fewer growers are able to grasp and use Dr. Ream’s technology (LaMotte tests). Fewer still understand or embrace Rudolph Steiner’s concept commonly know as bio-dynamics (see TESTIMONIALS below). As a biophysicist, I have to admit, that in my opinion, the Steiner concepts most accurately define and match the true nature of nature.

Each substance from a single atom to a complex molecule has its own frequency pattern. All living organisms (including man) can detect those patterns of subtle energy. Substances with frequencies that don’t resonate with an organism cause interference in the efficiency we mentioned earlier. Substances with resonating frequencies enhance the life force of organisms receiving them.  All Steiner type (bio-dynamic) products and their actions are based on the frequencies imbedded in the product. The products can influence soils, plants, livestock, atmospheric conditions and more. When MI grower Dan Underwood dried out his “too wet to be on” field in 2 days using Greg Willis energy or frequency sprays (June 09 CSI newsletter) in his broadcasting tower he “saw” energy in action.

That is why I recommend a 3 step process to you for doing your part to change the conventional Ag paradigm before it destroys our way of life. The three steps are Re-mineralization, Bio-activation and Subtle Energy use and control. Re-mineralization – add the minerals the CEC soil test show you deficient in.  Bio-activation – add manures, composts, fish, seaweeds, microbes, etc – that the LaMotte soil test shows you need. Subtle Energy – foliar feeding and  Broadcasting Towers (consider GW sprays).

TESTIMONIALS:

• Mark Fulford, international consultant and Monroe, ME organic garlic grower put N fixing Bioplin on his garlic in 2009. He wrote “The plants greened up but not the ‘normal’ chemical green. When the garlic bulb produced a scape (seed head) Mark removed the scape by cutting it off. At this point the garlic bulb usually dies within 3 weeks. Mark found that by using Bioplin he was able to obtain 1 extra week of growth. This is a 33% increase in growth time and he sells his garlic by the pound. “This season looks very good so far (6/9/10), strong plants which were inoculated with Bioplin as a dip. Seed was pre treated and floated for culling using peroxide and vinegar dip.”

• John Martin, Williamsburg, IN says his KY grower ran out of NutriTech & fish and noted 6” less hay growth. His corn starter included Bioplin and lots of rain followed. The yellow is gone and green is back. “I’ve used this fish for 30 years and I know the fish alone would not have done that”.

• Kent Friedrichsen, Perry, IA reports using NutriTech N fixing & (P releasing microbe) with fish and some of his manure pit water on corn. “The corn turned a John Deere green rather than the dark black green of my neighbors”. He also foliar feed fish and NutriFoliar (N fixing for foliage) on a water stressed field on a Thursday night (then received 3” more of rain on Friday and Saturday) and the corn greened up on Sunday and Monday.

• Kamon Reynolds, Gainsboro, TN, “In 2008 we decided to plant a quarter of an acre of blackberries. The soil we were using is 15-20 ft above our field crops in the valley of a very rocky hillside. Loggers used this location 2 years ago with their dozers and very heavy equipment. We found our gas powered auger would not even dent the soil to able us to put in our posts so we had to do it by hand. We used your Tennessee brown, some high calcium lime, other minerals and cover cropped as you suggested. After using your microbial products to dip roots in we planted them in 18inch dug holes mixing 30% mushroom castings in the late fall of 2008. The plants were on average 6 inches tall and had a stem of 1/8th of an inch.  In the spring of 2009 we mulched them heavily and sprayed fish kelp, molasses, and Super Cal on the soil also using Tainio foliar sprays with your fish and kelp rotating biweekly.  The results were amazing. The blackberry plants now (12/30/09) cover a 6 foot tall by 14-16 foot wide area of trellis and they turned one year old in the last part of September, 2009. The plants laughed against bug pressure. I have seen grapes on this same property get defoliated in a matter of days due to Japanese beetles. I allowed a few plants to produce some fruit and it was the sweetest blackberries I have ever experienced. Since I make my career as a local food producer having a product that is easy to grow (without fear of bug pressure) and produces a fruit that is many times sweeter than the competition is great! People come back for the sweetest foods (who blames them?)”. This spring he writes, “I’ve been using PKS&Cal – Great Stuff!”

• Wayne Underwood, Perrington, MI age 67. “A few years ago I would have thought the whole idea of a Broadcasting Tower was a crack pot idea. But after reading about it and our own on-the-farm research I’m sold on it. For one thing, our soil has a good feel to it now. I really believe it has helped preventing fungus as well. We’ve had no problems with our wheat while people around us have. It’s saved us money as well.”

• Doug Kratz, Maldern, AR, says he grows the best strawberries. A grower with about 50 year’s experience, he also grows blackberries, blueberries, Muscatine grapes and peaches. He has used Greg Willis’ basic A, B, C and D sprays with the old Fungus Interruptus™ for about 3 years.  This year, Doug sprayed with his usual fungicide at the start of the growing season, used one application of the old Fungus Interruptus™, then two applications of the new Super Strength Fungus Interruptus™.  This year, not only is his fruit the best in the state, he has absolutely no fungus of any kind growing on any of his crops. His quote, “Super Strength Fungus Interruptus™ is the best, least expensive and most effective fungus preventative there is today.”

OTHER NEWS:

• Effects of Common Pesticides at Environmental Concentrations, is an excellent presentation made at 2010 MOSES conference by Dr. Warren Porter, professor at U of WI, Madison. His findings provide details on what Atrazine® and other farm chemicals do to the body. His talk is very informative and cause for real concern and caution! For an audio CD copy of his presentation call: 952-432-3079.

• Julian Cribb, Adjunct Profession in Science Communication at the University ofTechnology Sydney predicts the cost of chemical fertilizers that prop up world agriculture could skyrocket up to ten times in only 20 years.http://acresaustralia.com.au/

• RoundUp/Glyphosate: See Silver Bullets: Eco System Disruptors in ATTRAnews, June 2010 issue (Vol 18, # 2),.http://attra.ncat.org/newsletter/attranews_0610.html#story5

• Insects: See ATTRAnews Orrsop’s Fable: Many Little Hammershttp://attra.ncat.org/newsletter/attranews_0610.html#story4

http://attra.ncat.org/newsletter/attranews_0610.html

• Christine Jones, Ph.D. – Soil carbon – can it save agricultures bacon?http://amazingcarbon.com/

P3 “Mycorrhizal fungi, which are totally dependent on dissolved organic carbon from green plants, trade carbon with colonies of bacteria located at their hyphal tips in exchange for macro-nutrients such as phosphorus, organic nitrogen, calcium and such trace elements as zinc, boron, copper and plant growth stimulating substances (Killham 1994, Leake et al. 2004)…”

“Mycorrhizal fungi and associative bacteria are very strongly inhibited by excessive soil disturbance and the high levels of water-soluble phosphorus and nitrogen commonly used in modern agriculture (Killham 1994, Leake et al. 2004). Where soils have been subjected to cultivation and/or the application of MAP, DAP, superphosphate, urea or anhydrous ammonia, the suppressed mycorrhizal colonization of plant roots significantly reduces carbon flow. The structural degradation of agricultural soils, accompanied by mineral depletion in food, has largely been the result of the inhibition of this natural carbon pathway.”

“When carbon supply is limited by the loss of the primary pathway for sequestration, the physical, chemical and biological functions normally performed by healthy soil are markedly reduced.”

P3 “The analyses (soil samples from farmed paddocks of either high or low productivity) revealed that the most important determinant of soil productivity was the level of soil carbon (measured as organic matter in Strzelecki’s day).”

P4 “Strzelecki’s data indicate that organic matter levels in the early settlement period were around five to ten times higher than in many soils today.)”

P5 “This contradicts the widely promoted belief that nitrogenous fertilizer needs to be added in order for stable soil carbon to form. Indeed, the opposite is true (Khan it al.2007, Larson 2007), Mulvaney et al. 2009)” (Plus, as Bruce Tainio taught, properly grown crops should realize a net increase in organic matter when considering both above and below ground mass).

“If plants are mycorrhizal, they don’t require nitrogen in a mineralized form, that is, in the form of nitrate or ammonium. In order to transport mineralized nitrogen, mycorrhizal fungi have to convert it to glutamate, which represents an energy cost. For this reason nitrogen is preferentially transported in an organic form, generally as amino acids such as glycine and glutamine (Leake et al. 2004).”

P6 “The nutritional status of soils, plants, animals and people has fallen dramatically in the last 50 years, due to losses in soil carbon, the key driver for soil nutrient cycles… …food produced from depleted soils does not contain the essential trace minerals required for the effective functioning of our immune systems.”

“At the beginning of this paper it was noted that the level of agricultural real debt inAustralia had increased almost 6-fold over the last 15 years. …Many of these products inhibit microbial diversity, preventing natural carbon flow to soils.” Used with permission.

See: http://amazingcarbon.com/PDF/JONES-SoilCarbon&Agriculture%2818May10%29.pdf

Tomato Fungus:

• Greg Willis comments on tomato fungus: Blight is a fungus.  Fungi show up when there is death or dying in a plant. SSFI (Super Strength Fungus Interruptus spray) restores a measure of life in a plant tricking it into thinking that there is no role for fungi. There are as many different kinds of fungi as there are plants and situations in which fungi become active.  That’s why there are so many different kinds of fungi that “attack” tomatoes.

But if this has continues for very long, the problem is more fundamental and SSFI will become no more than a band-aid temporarily solving a problem.

Tomatoes require compost made of composted plants, non-diseased plants to be sure, but a tomato plant compost is best. (Reams always said plants do best when they utilize nutrients of their own frequency). Tomatoes also need calcium and sulfur.  (Our solution would be PKS & Cal.)

In the interim, a application of the Ultra 12 Step spray and SSFI should help.  I can’t say it will be the cure since blight is indicative of far deeper problems that must be addressed in the soil and the relationship between the vine and the sun and warmth.

• Dr. Richard Olree writes, “Tell your milk producers to learn about the A1 genetic milk problem and to get their cows tests. It’s about $25 to test”. Go to his site for more:http://www.emineral.info/

• For you who signed Dan Kittredge’s Nutrient-Dense Manifesto at the 2009AcresUSA conference, this document is now nicely displayed on a prototype website:www.nutrient-dense.info/manifesto 

THANKS for your trust and business. Good growing and good crops to you this year,

Dr. Phil, Louisa, Sue and Ron